Xela's Garden

Hollyhocks [V+S]

Species: Malvaceae Althaea rosea..

Planted 03.10 Vistabile garage border
03.10 Shenstone wisteria border
03.11.Blossom Cottage lilac border
Bought 03.10 Morrisons 3 plants for £1
03.11 ? ? ?


Hollyhock
Biennial
Family: Malvaceae Althaea rosea

An old favourite that has long been a feature of the cottage gardens of Britain, having been originally introduced from China, where it is a native.
Although perennial, it is generally treated as a biennial.

There are both single- and double-flowered forms, many flowers, four to five inches in diameter, being borne on substantial stems that will attain a height of six or seven feet.
The colours range from white and yellow to shades of pink to scarlet, crimson and purple.
Planted in groups at the back of the border, the Hollyhock lends itself to bold effect, especially if planted against a background of dark green.
The foliage is large and rounded and is produced beneath the flower-spike; it is sometimes subject to rust, which is best controlled by dusting with green sulphur immediately the first symptoms appear.
For successful cultivation a deep loamy soil, trenched three spits deep, is necessary and good drainage is essential.

Best treated as a biennial by sowing seed in June to produce plants that will flower in the following year.

The flowering season is on August and September.

Hollyhock
Hardy Perennial
Five to seven feet.
Colours various, July to September.

The Hollyhock is the tallest and stateliest of all the Mallows; it has associations with those vague but pleasing qualities called “old-fashioned” and “old-world”; it is one of the chief properties of English farmhouse and cottage gardens; it satisfies the soul of the artist and the artisan alike.

It is hardy and not particular as to soil; its habit is bold and handsome, and the range of colour in its flowers is great.
But for one fatal blot on its character it would be one of the most desirable of all border plants; the dread Mallow fungus (puccinia malvacearum) makes its culture at all times difficult and sometimes impossible.

The first signs if the plague is a small yellow or rusty spot which forms on the under side of the lower leaves and penetrates tot eh upper surface.
This rapidly extends; the leaves, speckled all over with black and orange mould, shrivel and fall, and if the plant has strength left to develop the flower spike, it does so in a miserable condition, ragged and foul, or even leafless.
It is for each grower to determine for themselves whether the degree to which the disease affects the plant in his garden is sufficient to make them abandon the attempt to grow it; or whether the results obtained justify the continuance of the struggle.
There are no remedies of any real value, when once the attack is developed; syringing with diluted Condy’s Fluid (permanganate of potassium) has been recommended, but has little effect.
Seedlings are of stouter stamina than plants raised from cuttings, and should always be chosen; but this is no safeguard, as the plants are often covered with the fungus as soon as they have formed six leaves in the seed bed.
There is no doubt that the soil and the air of a garden may become impregnated with the spores of the fungus; but it is a matter deserving more attention from garden authorities than it seems to have received, bow far the germs of this and other fungoid growths may be contained dormant in seed from infected stocks.
The best chance for the hollyhock grower lies in clean soil, one that has grown no Hollyhocks before, and if possible any Mallows of any kind; as they are all liable to forms of the complaint.
All infected plants should, of course, be burned.

Hollyhock plants may be bought and planted in March, or seed may be sown in the open, about three quarters of an inch deep in drills, in June and July.
The seedlings must be pricked out when a couple of inches high; handle the forky and rather brittle roots with care.
The old-fashioned double kinds are the showiest; but the single strains have been much improved of late years, and now flower in a handsome spike, instead of by desultory blooms as they once did.
The colours comprise very deep maroon (almost black), claret, crimson, various shades of pink and rose, orange-buff, buff-yellow, primrose, white, besides several shaded or mixed hues difficult to name.
There is one very beautiful form of flower, in which a broad border of single petals makes a “guard” or setting for the double centre.
The single flowered kinds show all the colours of the doubles, and are decidedly easier to raise and grow.
The ground must be made as good as possible for Hollyhocks, dug two spits deep, with plenty of strong manure under the lower one and lighter stuff mixed with the upper.

Clumps of two or three plants, set two feet apart, may be put at the back of mixed borders; or rows of plants may line the edge of a path.
A strong stake, six feet out of the ground, must be firmly fixed alongside of each plant before it is more than half-grown, and the stems securely tied to it with tar-string as they advance.
In dry summer weather abundance of water should be given to the plants, and the ground for a couple of feet round the stems covered with two inches of old manure and leaf-mould as a mulch.
When the flower spikes are past, the stems may be cut down to within a few inches of the ground.
In the following spring the crowns should be examined, and any plant making a good show of green leaves at the base may be left to flower the second summer.
In many cases the roots will be found in a feeble condition if not entirely decayed; and to keep up a show of Hollyhocks they must be grown strictly as biennials and a fresh batch raised every year.

(Source: www.garden-centre.org/plants/Hollyhock.htm)

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